Shattered
by quinndex
Summary: Lindsay Monroe's life shattered like a glass vase dropped on concrete when witnessed the multiple murder of her three best friends... For Lindsay, this is the end. But can she move on, and create a new life for herself without the three girls she thought would always be there for her?
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer: I don't own the characters and probably half of this story line since the main idea is taken right out of 3-18. So pretty much all credit goes to the creators of CSI:NY, and the writers and whoever else. This story is not being used to make money, it's written purely for entertainment purposes. However, the small portion of this story (such as the plotline of the aftermath of the multiple-homicide-in-a-diner thing) which did come from my head, is mine, and should not be used without my permission.**

**Anyway, now that's over...so this is the prologue. It might be short, but I promise you the chapters will be longer. It's from a third person perspective, which is new for me (I'm used to first person) so I don't know how well it'll work out... **

**That's enough rambling from me for now, because soon I'll have written an author's note that's longer than the prologue.**

**EDIT (4th Sept): I have received a review from a guest which pointed out some inconsistencies with this fanfiction. I have attempted to erase these, but I would like to know if I missed any. Thanks.**

PROLOGUE

The diner was nearly empty; the only customers left were four girls who'd been sitting there for at least an hour, and an old man sitting near the door. What little hair this man had left was a snowy white, and his face was more wrinkled than the trunk of a knarled old tree. He sipped his cup of tea for a time, but then decided to push himself up from the chair and hobble out into the street, drink unfinished. The waitress, a young girl called Sarah who'd seen the girls around school – she was a junior – but had never seen the man, wandered over and collected the half-finished drink, and mopped up the few tiny drops of tea that had somehow found their way to the table.

The four girls hardly noticed this, mostly because it was happening at the other end of the diner. The girls were teenagers, just fifteen years old, and they'd just finished their freshman year two weeks before. Two of the girls had known each other before they even began school, and they'd made friends with the other two before the first ever semester was over. None of them could imagine life without their friends.

Jackie Bellamy was the youngest of the four; she'd only turned fifteen a week or so before the summer started. Jackie's hair was long and blonde, with some darker streaks, and her eyes were a pale, misty grey. She was also the tallest, although Kelly wasn't far off. Kelly Thompson had dark hair and muddy brown eyes, and she sometimes took on a mothering role with her friends, since she was the oldest. The other two girls were Eleanor Grant, who had hair so dark it was almost black, and smallish, beetle-black eyes; and Lindsay Monroe, who had paler brown hair than Kelly, and wide chocolate eyes.

Sarah smiled as she watched the four girls. She could remember being fifteen – she had thought she was old then, that she wasn't a kid any more, but looking at these four girls she was startled to realise how young they seemed to her. Sarah remembered clearly the excitement she'd felt at starting high school, and she almost laughed. High school was just like any other school – it brought her the good days, the best friends, and the boy she'd once have taken a bullet for, but it also brought her the worst days, the fake, back-stabbing friends, and the boy who decided he'd gotten fed up of her and wanted something more exciting.

"Seriously, Linds," Sarah heard the blonde girl say, "give Kelly a break. Just because Sam Bergmann asked her out and she turned him down -"

"_I_ wouldn't have turned him down," Lindsay responded, cutting Jackie off and flicking her hair back over her shoulders. "Sam's not a jerk like most other guys, plus he's quite good-looking. Just because he's a little weird..."

"A little?" Eleanor said with a laugh, shaking her head slightly. "He spends his lunchtimes in the library, reading or doing his homework. Plus, I've only ever heard him talk twice."

Jackie raised her eyebrows and tucked a few strands of corn-coloured hair behind her ear whilst Kelly whispered something into Lindsay's ear, knocking over a small pot of jam as she did so. "You just don't like him because he's the only person who can beat you at chess, Els," the blonde girl reminded her.

"I've never even played him!" Eleanor protested, truthfully.

"Only because you know he can beat you," Kelly told her. "You saw him playing the computer in the library on the most difficult setting, remember? You said you were scared because he's so good."

Eleanor glared at her friend – not because she didn't like Kelly, but because she knew that Kelly knew she was acting it. Lindsay cut in. "Well, Kelly, if you think he's so good at chess, then why didn't -"

"I said he could beat Els at chess," Kelly interrupted. "I didn't say I wanted to go out with him!"

"Nobody would want to go out with Sam Bergmann," Jackie muttered, as Lindsay accidentally brushed her left palm in a blob strawberry jam that Kelly had spilt earlier. "Except Linds, of course. Most other people have some kind of taste in guys."

Lindsay was stood up – not out of anger, but because of the jam. "You guys are so picky," she said as she headed off to the restroom to wash it off. None of her friends really knew Sam Bergmann – he was always the chess club boy to them, the science nerd, the guy who came top of the class in every test. To Lindsay, though, he was a friend – his brother Kyle, and Lindsay's own brother, Chris, were best friends, and Sam was a regular visitor at the Monroe household. Once, he'd even fended off some bullies when Lindsay ended up in the EP science class at middle school, without any of her friends, and a couple of boys had decided to pick on her.

The sound of the other girls' laughter and chatter found its way to Lindsay, and the girl smiled. She knew some kids weren't as lucky to have such good friends as she did; they all had each others' backs, and none of them would ever break the trust between them. They were like sisters, almost quadruplets in a way. They would be lost without each other.

Lindsay turned the tap on and washed the jam off her left palm. The sound of the faucet running would have relaxed her if she were angry or upset, as it always did, but right then she didn't need calming. She registered the sound of the door chime, but didn't think much of it, and she was about to turn and walk out of the restroom when -

BANG

It made Lindsay jump, but that was nothing compared to what was happening in the next room. Screams and shouts and yells, all the voices distorted with fear – distorted beyond recognition. The sounds twisted the inside of Lindsay's head. Kelly and Jackie and Eleanor were in there, screaming, yelling, crying out in fear... Lindsay knew she should do something, but she was frozen on the spot, a statue made of ice.

BANG

BANG

BANG


	2. One: Ruby Red

**Disclaimer: I don't own the characters and probably half of this story line since the main idea is taken right out of 3-18. So pretty much all credit goes to the creators of CSI:NY. This story is not being used to make money, it's written purely for entertainment purposes. However, the small portion of this story (such as the plotline of the aftermath of the multiple-homicide-in-a-diner thing) which did come from my head, is mine, and should not be used without my permission.**

**So... the first chapter. Bets placed on how long I'll stick with this before I give up? I'd say three, maybe four chapters, from experience. It's a miracle I've managed to finish any story I've ever written (one of which was on my now-deleted Wattpad account, and the other is in a notepad and won't be read by anyone ever). But that has nothing to do with this, so I'll stop rabbiting on now and let you read the first chapter.**

CHAPTER ONE: RUBY RED

Hands over her ears, hunched up in a ball, almost underneath the restroom's sink... Lindsay wasn't sure how long she sat there. The silence seemed deafening. No chattering, no laughter, none of Kelly's stupid jokes...

But there were footsteps. One, two. One, two. One, two.

The faucet was still running, the sound of the water splashing into the white basin still constant. Where the sound of running water used to calm Lindsay in times of distress, it now made her more afraid. Would whoever was outside hear it? Would they come for her, too? Shoot her like they'd shot the others?

The shadow outside passed the door again. Slowly, Lindsay managed to make her way to the door, and silently slip it open, just enough to see out. Why she did so, she wasn't sure.

Red. Ruby red blood. That's what the man was covered in. Blood like the juice from cherries, blood the colour of roses and rubies and the wallpaper in Eleanor's bedroom. The blood of Lindsay's friends. He was covered from head to foot, some of the blood dripping, some of it already dried. His dark clothes were dyed brighter, his brown hair was soaked, his face was masked in the scarlett paint. His stony grey eyes were like storms, glaring out at the world in front of him. In his hand, also decorated in the new must-have colour for killers this summer, was a shotgun.

Lindsay retreated from the door, tiptoeing backwards until her back pressed up to the far wall of the restroom.

Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale.

Breathe.

Eventually, the footsteps outside began to head towards the door, and the chime sounded again. Lindsay gritted her teeth at the cheery sound that seemed to enjoy her distress. Inhale, exhale, she reminded herself. Inhale, exhale.

Time ticked by, and, after a couple of minutes that felt like hours, Lindsay found the strength to move again. Fearing what lay on the other side of the restroom door, she pulled it open and stepped out. Her legs almost collapsed underneath her, but somehow she stayed on her feet.

The first person she saw was Eleanor. Lying on the floor, in a pool of blood that had poured out from underneath her. The shot to her stomach must have gone all the way through... The blood stain on her blouse almost looked like a rose. A ruby red rose on a pale pink background. Some blood had splattered onto her forehead, as well. Lindsay wondered if it was hers or someone else's... Eleanor's eyes were closed, as if she were asleep, as if she would wake up in a few hours' time...

Jackie was lying on her front a couple of metres away, her head turned to the side, her arm out at a right-angle in a pool of scarlet liquid. Her blonde hair was dip-dyed ruby. She, like Eleanor, looked like she could have been sleeping, except Jackie always slept on her back. She never could have slept like that.

Kelly was lying across a burgundy seat, with the chair she'd been sat on knocked over at her feet. Most of her upper body – including the blood that was undoubtedly present – was hidden behind the dark seat, and Lindsay couldn't make herself walk towards her and see what her friend looked like now.

The waitress – Sarah – was lying by the register. Lindsay couldn't make her eyes focus on her. She hadn't known this woman, she didn't know anything about her, whereas her friends she'd known for as long as she could remember. Trying not to think, trying not to let it sink in, Lindsay crossed to the register and dialled 911.

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

"Sweetie, it's over now, OK?" the police officer reassured Lindsay, crouching down in front of the crying girl. "Can you just tell me what happened, sweetie, please?"

Lindsay stared at him. She didn't know what to say, and she didn't think she could've gotten the words out anyway. Since the 911 call, she hadn't made a sound. She'd followed the police's instructions without a word, and now she sat in the back of a police car, with the door open and her legs dangling outside the vehicle. Her back was to the crime scene; apparently, nobody thought she could've handled it if she was facing the scene.

"OK, sweetie, can you tell me your name?" the officer questioned. He had an annoying habit of calling young girls whose names he didn't know 'sweetie'. "My name is Officer Jason Lee, remember? I need you to tell me yours, sweetie. Can you do that for me? Just say your name."

The officer – Officer Lee – was in his forties and completely bald. His eyes were a cold, dark brown, and his skin was pale in comparison. His nose was thin, and his face round. His police hat made him look like a train conductor, and he didn't blink enough. Maybe he was trying to maintain eye contact with Lindsay, but it was just freaking her out.

Officer Lee sighed. He had a sneaking suspicion that he wasn't going to get this girl to talk. She was just going to sit there in silence while he did the talkinf. "OK, then, sweetie," he said. "You don't have to talk right now, if you don't want to. But we need to know what happened at some point, OK, sweetie?"

Lindsay glanced down at her knees. _Gone, _said a little voice in the back of her head. _Your friends are gone and you didn't do anything to save them. You just stayed in that restroom like a pathetic excuse for a teenage girl and let them die. You didn't even try._

The teenager didn't know exactly what she could have done, but she was sure she could have done something. Anything. She could have at least tried to save them. She could have stopped what happened. She knew there was something she should have done, that there was something she did wrong. Her friends were dead and it was all her fault.

Suddenly, a commotion started at the end of the street. A boy in his late teens was struggling against two police officers. "My sister was there!" he shouted. "My sister – let me past, dammit. Let me past! My sister, she was in Tania's Diner, she went there with her friends!"

Officer Lee looked from the young man to Lindsay and back again. They were similar in appearance – the same brown eyes, the same face shape, the same sort of build. "Is he your brother?" the police officer asked. Lindsay nodded silently.

"Let him through," Officer Lee called over to his colleagues. "His sister's here. She's the one who made the 911 call."

The dark-haired boy came barrelling through. "Lindsay!" he gasped when he reached the car; he'd known where she was since he could see her when Officer Lee shouted to let him through. "Lindsay, are you OK?"

Lindsay nodded again, still silent as a rock. Her brother pulled her into a tight embrace, and she rested her head on his shoulder. "Linds, thank God you're alive," he muttered. "When I heard...when Dave said there'd been shots, Linds, my heart stopped. Thank God you're safe."

The officer let Lindsay and her brother finish their embrace before he tapped on the older teenager's back. The brother kept his arm around his sister, even though there was hardly enough room for both of them in the seat, while he listened to the officer speak. "My name is Officer Jason Lee. I've been trying to get your sister to talk, but she won't."

The boy glanced worriedly in Lindsay's direction. "Did...did she get hurt?" he whispered, fearing the answer. But he had to know. Of course he had to know.

"No," Officer Lee assured him. "But when my fellow officers were trying to contain you over there, you said she came here with her friends?" The boy nodded. "She was the sole survivor. We're trying to work out what happened in there, but it looks like she witnessed the deaths of her friends."

Lindsay's brother looked at the floor for a brief second before he turned back to his sister. "Dammit, Linds," he muttered. "God, no."

"Um...sir?" Officer Lee said. "Could you tell me your name and your sister's name, please. Just for the record. And her friends' names, if you know them."

"I'm Ollie – I mean, Oliver Monroe. This is Lindsay," Ollie told him. "Her friends are – were – Kelly Thompson, Eleanor Grant and Jackie Bellamy. I have a picture..." Ollie paused to find the picture on his camera, which he always carried with him – he was into photography. "What's going to happen to her? ... I mean, this has got to affect her, right? Psychologically speaking."

The officer sighed. "That's not really my area of expertise, Mr. Monroe," he replied. "But already she's shown signs of distress. She's kept to herself, and she's been completely silent. She hasn't said a word."

"Lindsay," Ollie murmured, but he wasn't entirely sure what he was supposed to say – or even if there was anything to say.

"Are your parents at home?" Officer Lee queried, but Ollie shook his head.

"They went to California. A friend of my dad's lives there," Ollie explained, and the officer nodded. He told Ollie that it was probably best that Lindsay should go home, and to try and get her to talk at least some. Ollie nodded, and pulled his sister to her feet. He was ready to support her as they walked if she needed it, but she had other ideas.

"Officer?"

Officer Lee was surprised that the girl had spoken, but he tried not to show it. "Yes, Lindsay?"

"Promise me you'll find him," Lindsay said, determinedly. "Promise me you'll get the man who did this."

Technically speaking, Officer Lee couldn't promise the girl anything. But one glance at the teenager's desperate face, at the tear tracks that hadn't fully faded from her cheeks, though she'd run out of tears long before, and at the brother holding his broken sister close...that one glance was enough to break his heart. And so, he promised the one thing that he should never, ever promise. "We will, Lindsay," he told her. "We will find him. I promise."

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

She was curled up on her bed, silent, alone. Her two elder brothers sat by her sides, trying to talk to her, trying to reach her, but she was, and she remained, alone. Their parents were on the first flight back from California, the parents of the other girls were visiting the morgue to view the bodies. Part of Lindsay had wanted to go, to say goodbye, but she hadn't been able to force herself up, off the bed, and out of the door.

Kelly. Eleanor. Jackie. The three girls that were her sisters in every way that counted were never coming back. Officer Lee had promised that they would find the person responsible, but that wouldn't change what happened. No punishment would be enough, and none that came close were legal. Lindsay couldn't turn back time, and she couldn't save her friends.

She couldn't save her friends.

Maybe it wasn't logical that Lindsay was beating herself up over her friends' deaths. Maybe it was stupid to think that she could have done something, that it was her fault. Maybe there was nothing to gain from doing so except more pain. But the guilt of a survivor doesn't abide by the laws of logic.

Eventually, late that night, Ollie and Chris headed for their own bedrooms and left Lindsay to sleep. Their parents were due home in the early hours of the morning, and the boys hoped Lindsay might have gotten over the initial shock by then. But since she'd made Officer Lee promise to find the man who murdered her friends, Lindsay had lapsed into another silence and she couldn't be coaxed into speaking.

Laying on her bed, alone, in the dark, Lindsay closed her eyes. But she couldn't sleep; the face of the man who was covered in blood lik e he'd taken a bath in scarlet paint was scorched into the inside of her eyelids. He haunted her the whole night, and she didn't sleep.

**OK, so I'm not exactly the best for writing long chapters =( but I try my best. I wasn't as happy with this as I was with the prologue, but I don't generally tend to be too happy with whatever I come out with.**

**I would be extremely extremely happy if just one person decided to tell me what they thought. Even if they hated it (as long as it's constructive)..Please?**


	3. Two: The Morgue

**Disclaimer from previous chapters applies. Thank you to: sass box and CAT217 for the reviews =)**

**Sorry I haven't updated for a couple of days. I had a three-night sleepover with a couple of friends of mine, since we're back at school on Friday, so I haven't had any time to write. Sorry... Also, being back at school will mean I can't update as often as I'd like. Be patient with me, please?**

CHAPTER TWO: THE MORGUE

Oliver Monroe Sr. was worried about his daughter. He'd got a call from the City of Bozeman Police Department not three hours before, telling him that Lindsay had witnessed a shooting. He and his wife, Isabel, had boarded the first plane home from San Francisco, but they wouldn't be home for a few hours.

"She's going to be OK," Isabel muttered, knowing that her husband was having doubts about whether Lindsay would ever really recover from this. "She's a stubborn girl. A warrior. She'll make it through."

Oliver sighed, but he didn't respond to his wife. He knew that she was just trying to make him feel better, but it wasn't working. What if Lindsay was forever haunted by what had happened? How would he handle seeing his only daughter spiral down into a deadly, unstoppable depression? How would he, as her father, deal with all the crazy things she might end up doing?

"Oliver, look at me," Isabel commanded, and her husband reluctantly turned his chocolate-coloured eyes towards her. Oliver had the same brown hair and dark eyes as Ollie Jr. and Lindsay, but the younger son, Chris, and Isabel looked completely different from them, both with piercing blue eyes and soft blonde hair. "Lindsay will be fine. Not today, not tomorrow, not next week, but someday. I promise you, she'll make it."

"And what if she doesn't?"

"She will."

Oliver stared out of the window. It was dark, and all he could really see was the wing of the plane and a few stars in the night sky. Concentrating on the stars, he prayed that his wife would be right. The next few months, the next few years possibly, were going to be hard for the entire Monroe family. Lindsay's brothers were very protective of her, and Oliver himself couldn't stand to see his only daughter even the slightest bit upset. And as for Isabel – she was the girl's mother. Aside from Lindsay, the coming months would be hardest on Oliver's wife.

The stars outside shone brightly, scattered around in the velvet of the night. Oliver remembered when he was at school, reading a book and analysing everything that was written. The stars, back then, would have symbolised hope; they were a reminder that not all was lost. Remembering how he used to laugh at his English teachers, Oliver groaned. How he hoped now that the stars would do their job and bring a little light into what was left of his daughter's life.

Suddenly, the seatbelt sign flashed on. They were entering turbulence. Isabel rested her head on Oliver's shoulder as the airplane rocked around. Oliver continued to stare at the stars.

Isabel sat bolt upright without warning, making her husband jump. Wordlessly, she stared out of the window at the engine that was just visible underneath the wing. Oliver stared at it, too; he'd never known much about planes, but he knew enough. He was pretty sure the engines weren't supposed to catch fire.

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

"Mom and Dad should've been home by now," Chris muttered, making sure only Ollie could hear. Lindsay was across the room, curled up on the sofa; they'd managed to get her downstairs from her bedroom, but she still hadn't said a word.

Ollie glanced at his watch. His parents' flight should have come in little more than an hour ago. "Maybe they got caught up at the airport," he whispered back. It couldn't be anything serious, he told himself, trying to shake off the feeling that something had gone terribly wrong. They'd already had more than their fair share of bad fortune in the past twenty-four hours.

Chris nodded and turned on the TV. The news was on; something about plans to make a film about the Titanic to be released next year. He flicked it onto the next channel – he didn't want the news to abruptly change to what happened yesterday and trigger some kind of breakdown from Lindsay.

It was a documentary about crime. Typical, thought Chris, as he watched a redhead man take a blood sample from a dead body, that this would be on today of all days. He turned over to the next channel.

"No," his sister said suddenly. "Leave that on."

Ollie was about to argue when he realised that this was the first thing Lindsay had said that morning. He knew she didn't need to see that documentary, especially because of what had happened the day before, but he nodded to Chris to turn back to the previous channel.

It wasn't something Ollie would have let his sister watch ordinarily – he tried to protect his sister the best he could, from guys who hit on her to graphic TV shows like this one. Everything he _could_ save her from. He'd beaten himself up a little whilst he lay in bed the night before, battling the part of him that thought he'd failed to protect her. But he knew, rationally, that there'd been nothing he could do to stop what happened, and the rational part of him had won in the end.

Lindsay's eyes were glued to the TV screen. The documentary was about an Idaho case about two years before, and the ginger ME was explaining about the victim's blood, and how the machine detected the heroin that had been running through his veins. He'd died of a drug overdose, yet he'd been found in a river; an unlikely place for a drug user to OD.

The other CSIs were processing the river, and every so often the scene would switch to an interview with one of them and they would explain something about the case. The tree bark on the victim's clothes that wasn't from any of the trees nearby. How DNA and fingerprinting worked. How rigor and lividity told them that the victim had died about six to eight hours before he was found, and he'd been dumped in the river at least two hours after his death.

The documentary was on for an hour and a half, though they'd missed the first twenty minutes. Lindsay paid attention to every word, every glimpse of the evidence, every little clue. She'd worked out who it was before the CSIs on TV did; it was the man's brother, who knew he was an addict and thought he could get away with a lethal overdose.

Chris and Ollie paid more attention to Lindsay than they did to the TV screen. She didn't break down halfway through, as they'd expected, though she didn't comment on anything or make a sound at all. She was leaning forwards for most of the program; she was interested in it. At certain points and twists in the case, she wore a puzzled expression. At other times, she displayed hatred for the killer, and sympathy for the victim, and sometimes she just watched, expressionless.

When the program was over, she sat back on the comfortable midnight-blue sofa and thought. About her friends, and their murders. About who might have done it. About how crime scene science was going to catch him – and she knew they were going to catch him, because Officer Lee had promised they would.

"Lindsay?" Ollie asked gently. Lindsay looked up, eyebrows raised. "What are you thinking, Linds?"

She shrugged, not saying a word. He hadn't expected her to; she'd only spoken twice since the murders. But part of him had hoped that she'd recovered slightly, that watching the documentary had done her good.

Chris tapped on Ollie's shoulder and motioned for him to exit the room. Once in the hallway, Chris spoke. "Mom and Dad should've got back two hours ago, Ollie," he said. "I don't think they just got delayed at the airport. Something's wrong."

Ollie nodded, but then Lindsay appeared by his side. "I want to go see them," she announced. "At the morgue. Kelly and Eleanor and Jackie."

"I'll take her," Chris offered. "I'll take the Pinto. Mom won't mind."

Nodding his consent, Ollie turned to his sister. "Are you sure you want to, Linds?" he questioned. She bobbed her head a little as Ollie's eyes searched her face for any sign of indecision, and then followed her other brother out the back door.

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

The morgue didn't smell of death, like Lindsay had expected, but more of...cleaning products. Bleach. The silver drawers stood proud and tall against the far wall, and the autopsy tables crouched on the floor, as if ashamed of their lower status. The window separated Chris and Lindsay from the bodies of the four most recent murder victims.

The ME, Dr. Adam Cadence, came out. He'd uncovered the four girls' faces after Lindsay arrived, but he could tell she wasn't content standing on the other side of the wall where the viewing window was. "Lindsay? Do you want to come in?" he offered. "I'm afraid you can't touch the bodies, but..."

Lindsay glanced at Chris, who nodded, before she followed Dr. Cadence inside. Kelly was nearest the door, and the survivor walked up to her first. The bullet had hit her in the chest, just below the neck, and the wound wasn't quite covered by the blue sheet. Where most people looked peaceful in death, Kelly looked restless. Like she wouldn't rest until the killer was caught.

Jackie was the next one along. Her wound was similar to Kelly's, maybe a little further to the right, maybe just a tiny bit messier. She was on her back now. She could sleep...

Eleanor was the farthest away of Lindsay's friends. The sheets were in two parts – on over each girl's chest, and another over the waist and the top of their legs. Eleanor's bullet wound had hit her in the stomach, whereas the other two girls were hit in the heart. Lingering here, Lindsay studied the wound. It was round, like someone had taken a cylinder of her flesh like they did with the ice in the North Pole. But ice didn't bleed.

The waitress was nearest to the silver drawers. Her toetag identified her as Sarah Gibson; Lindsay hadn't known her name before then. Lindsay didn't care that Sarah had died – maybe she would have, normally, but she had her friends to grieve now.

"What order did they die in?" Lindsay whispered.

Dr. Cadence frowned. "I'm sorry, Lindsay. I can't give you that information in an ongoing case," he told her. "But I can promise you that we're going to do everything we can to find this guy."

Lindsay looked up at him, away from the bodies. She'd already gotten this promise from Officer Lee the day before, but she felt like she needed to back it up somehow. "Promise me you'll find him," she demanded.

"I can't."

"You will," Lindsay pressed. "Promise me that. You will."

Dr. Cadence could see that Lindsay wasn't going to give up. He sucked in a deep breath, and hoped to hell that he'd be able to keep this promise. "OK, Lindsay. I promise. We'll find him." He managed a smile before he turned away, feeling like he'd just lied to her. In fact, even _we're going to do everything we can to find this guy_ was a lie, because Dr. Cadence was going to do everything in his power to make sure that the killer wasn't caught. Because he and Daniel might be cousins, but they were brought up as brothers. And, to Dr. Cadence, that connection was more important than the difference between right and wrong.

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

Lindsay stared at the almost-exact replica of the man who'd killed her friends. The sketch artist, who'd introduced himself as Malachi, smiled at her. "You did well," he said. The man in the sketch wasn't covered in blood, like the he had been when he killed Lindsay's friends, but it was still the same man.

The teenage girl almost smiled. She'd broken down into tears at least five times, and she'd had to take a break three times because she simply couldn't carry on. After all that, Malachi's comment was almost funny.

"Lindsay?" Malachi asked, sounding worried. Lindsay, however couldn't tear her eyes off _him_, and she couldn't escape the memories of the day before.

_Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang._ The gunshots bounced around her brain. Who was first? Who'd had to wait til last, and had seen what was coming for them long before it came? Lindsay suspected Kelly had been first; her chair had been knocked over at her feet, as if she'd pulled it over with her when she fell. Kelly hadn't had time to run.

The others hadn't been so successful in fleeing, either.

"I'm fine," Lindsay muttered. She'd spoken a lot more than she'd expected herself to today; her brothers, at least, were pleased with her progress, as was Officer Lee, who she'd given a statement to right after viewing the bodies. As soon as they'd learnt that Lindsay had seen the killer, they called on a sketch artist to work with her.

Malachi smiled at her. "You can go now, Lindsay. I will hand this over to the head of the crime lab."

Lindsay nodded, and got up to leave, but stopped. Chris was waiting by the door of the police station for her, but a female detective was talking to him, and he looked upset. He saw Lindsay watching him, and motioned for her to come outside.

"Linds, this is Detective Bramley," he told her. "She has...some bad news. Mom and Dad were on a plane on their way home after they heard what happened. The plane crashed."

Lindsay stared at him, trying to process that information. Eventually, she whispered, "Mom and Dad are dead?"


	4. Three: Cadence

**Disclaimer from previous chapters applies.**

**A guest posted a review pointing out a few inconsistencies with my story. I have tried to edit these out of my story, but if I haven't spotted something, can you please mention it? Thank you.**

CHAPTER THREE: CADENCE

Dr. Adam Cadence had been the Medical Examiner for the City of Bozeman Police Department for just over three years. In all those years, he had never had a person on his slab where he knew the killer – where that killer was related to him.

On the day of the murders, maybe ten minutes after the last girl died, Adam had heard a knock at the door. Daniel had been outside. He'd confessed to the murders, unofficially, and begged Adam for help. What was the medical examiner supposed to do? He threw Daniel in the shower, gave him some new clothes, and put him on the first flight to Chicago after telling him never to return. And the gun? He'd cleaned it off, and hidden it in the woods where nobody would ever find it.

The autopsies of the three girls and the young woman didn't hold anything that would help convict Daniel of murder. If they had, Adam would have disposed of it at the first chance. He wasn't sure what they'd found at the scene, but he prayed that Daniel hadn't left a single print behind.

But then there was the witness. Lindsay Monroe. Adam didn't know whether she'd seen Daniel in the diner, but he knew he had to find out. If she hadn't, she would be allowed to live. If she had seen him, she was too much of a risk.

The door of the morgue opened, and the head of the crime lab, Detective Bramley, walked in. "Hey, Adam," she said. "What have you got for me?"

The detective's eyes lingered on the body of Kelly Thompson. She shared the first name of this victim, and the body was bothering her more than the others. She'd never seen the girl before in her life.

"Not much, I'm afraid," Dr. Cadence told his superior. "The girls were killed with a shotgun, all at close range except for Jackie here. My guess is she tried to run. I haven't been able to figure out which order the girls fell in, but Jackie was probably last. The others didn't have enough time to run. Kelly over there had subdermal bruises consistent with the chairs on her leg; she could have just stood up when she was shot, so I'd guess either first or second for her. I can't tell with the others."

Detective Bramley sighed. None of this really helped their case, though she hadn't expected it to. "The bullets?" she questioned, and the Medical Examiner passed them over.

"There's nothing else," Dr. Cadence told her.

The detective took a deep breath. She wasn't sure they were going to catch the killer this time, what with the lack of evidence. "Well, at least we have Lindsay Monroe's statement," she muttered. Detective Bramley knew that Lindsay's mental state was hanging in the balance; how would she deal with the fact that the killer was never found?

"The witness?" questioned the doctor. "She viewed the bodies earlier. Seemed quite shaken up."

Detective Bramley nodded. "Can you imagine hearing the shots that kill your best friends?" she said. "Plus, she saw the killer's face afterwards. We got her to work with a sketch artist...I lost count of the times she had to stop and calm down. And then her parents were in that plane crash in Nevada..."

"Poor girl," Dr. Cadence murmured. The detective nodded, her heart breaking for the younger girl. Kelly Bramley had never experienced something like that in her entire life, yet Lindsay had to do it at such a young age.

"I'll get to work on these bullets. Thanks, Adam," she said, as she left the morgue. Adam stared after her for a few minutes. Little did she know, Kelly Bramley had just provided the information that signed the witness' death warrant.

Lindsay Monroe would not live to jeopardise Daniel's freedom much longer.

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

_Ten minutes earlier._

"Mom and Dad are dead?" Lindsay breathed.

Chris shook his head, and Lindsay let out a sigh of relief. She couldn't bear to lose anyone else. She'd already lost more than she could handle.

_Not yet, anyway, _Chris thought. "Mom's in a coma, Linds. She's in a hospital in Las Vegas. Critical condition." There was no point hiding it from her, and he might as well give it to her straight. "The prognosis is...well, it's not good, but it's not too bad, either." Even though Chris had told himself he'd give the news to his sister without editing it, he couldn't help leaving out the part where the doctors didn't think their mother would ever wake up again.

"And- and Dad?" Lindsay questioned, fearing the answer like it was a bear about to mangle her body until she was unrecognisable and have her for dinner.

"He's fine," Chris told her. "He's in a wheelchair, though, Linds. He's not going to leave Mom's bedside, either."

"They were very lucky," Detective Bramley told her. She checked her watch; the Medical Examiner would have finished his autopsies by now, and she needed to get downstairs. "The pilot was good; as soon as he realised something was wrong, he acted on it. If he had been less experienced, a lot more people would have died."

Lindsay nodded, thankful to the pilot, before she realised that she'd forgotten about her friends. _Don't forget about them_, she told herself._ You can't forget. It wouldn't be right to forget._

The detective studied the young girl. It was obvious that everything that had happened to her recently had taken its toll on her. The bags underneath her eyes suggested she hadn't slept last night, but that didn't surprise Detective Bramley. The girl was pale, almost a ghost, but that was to be expected. It would take time for her to get past this.

"I have to go down to autopsy," the head of the crime lab announced. "Dr. Cadence will have finished his autopsies." And with that, she left the brother and sister alone by the police station's door.

"Come on, Linds," Chris muttered. He pulled his sister out of the precinct and to their mother's Pinto. They clambered into the little red car and headed for home.

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

"Dad, I'm fine," Lindsay said for the thousandth time. She'd been on the phone with her father for at least an hour, talking about how she felt, about what had happened, about how she was going to deal with it. Lindsay just wanted to go lie in bed and stay there until she was ninety and then die.

Eventually, Oliver Monroe Sr. decided to talk to his eldest son. Ollie took the phone and listened seriously. "Take her to Dr. Jameson. He's a good therapist, the best in Bozeman. I don't care how much it costs, Ollie. Just pay for it, and get her in there."

Ollie swallowed and said he would. It was nearly five o'clock; Chris'd had lunch at the station, although Lindsay refused to eat anything. Dr. Jameson could have gone home for the day by then...but still, Ollie told his sister where they were taking her, and he and Chris forced her into the car. Eventually, they got her to the clinic.

Dr. Thomas Jameson was one of the best therapists in the state of Montana, if not the best. He was just leaving when Lindsay and her brothers arrived, but out of the kindness of his heart, he'd decided to give Lindsay a free session. He'd heard what had happened on the news, and he wanted to help the Monroes in any way he could.

Lindsay stared at the ruby red carpet in Dr. Jameson's office. Ruby red carpet. Ruby red blood. She swallowed.

Dr. Jameson sat her down on a wooden chair opposite his desk after Ollie filled out the forms. She fiddled with the armrest; she would do anything not to be here. Hadn't she done enough of this today, at the police station?

"Lindsay," Dr. Jameson said, his dark, almost-black eyes boring into hers. "As I understand, you witnessed a shooting yesterday. Is that correct?" He dipped his head so he could look at her face, since she was still looking down. She glanced up at him.

Lindsay hated the way the therapist was looking at her. Like she was crazy. Like she was going to break down at any minute... "It's not exactly confidential," she growled, glaring at the man, and surprising even herself.

"Would you like it to be?" Dr. Jameson asked, ignoring her tone.

"Apparently I don't have a choice."

Dr. Jameson glanced down at his desk. "Lindsay, I'm not your enemy," he told her. "I'm here to help you, OK?"

His words didn't calm Lindsay down at all – in fact, they made her even more agitated. "What if I don't want your help?"

Dr. Jameson studied the girl's face. She was angry – not as angry as some of his clients, but since she'd been pretty much silent since she witnessed the murders (according to her brothers), it was kind of surprising. But good? Dr. Jameson wasn't sure if it was good.

"I think you need it," he said, in response to her question.

The girl swallowed. Her dark brown hair was down, hanging over her shoulders; she was hiding her face. She was wearing jeans and a purple jacket – casual clothes, but sloppily worn. Her shoes didn't really go, but it didn't appear that she cared.

"I think it should be my choice," Lindsay told the blonde-haired therapist. "Don't you?"

Dr. Jameson looked the fifteen-year-old in the eye. "Lindsay, you've been through an incredibly traumatic experience," he reminded her. "I think that it would be best for you to have some kind of help. If you don't want one-on-one sessions, then you could always try group therapy. I had your friend Jackie's sister in here earlier; that's what she's going to do."

Lindsay almost growled. "I. Don't. Want. _Any_. Kind. Of. Help. I'll be fine on my own."

She was feisty – Dr. Jameson could say that much about her. She was also hiding a lot of pain. She was trying to be strong, but she wasn't going to manage for long. He could see that he wasn't going to do much good, though.

"OK, Lindsay," he said. "I think that will be all for today, don't you think? I'm sure we'll see each other again."

Lindsay rolled her eyes. "I'm sure we won't."

Dr. Jameson chose to ignore that comment. "Your brothers are in the waiting room." He waited until the girl left the room, and then stood up to go home himself.

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

_Three days later._

The rain fell softly onto the damp grass. The sky was blue, interrupted in places by patches of dark cloud. The wind travelled slowly; a light breeze. A rainbow formed itself above the trees.

Many of the gravestones were dark due to the water. Some looked mouldy; one Lindsay had seen had a small, vibrant green plant growing out of a crack in the stone. On some, the names were clear; on others, you could read nothing. Baby birds chirped from their nest in the branches of a nearby tree.

Four holes were dug in the ground, side by side, behind a row of trees. They were situated away from the other grave sites. Isolated. The trees created a shadow over the four six-foot-deep holes, making the day look darker than it naturally was.

Lindsay Monroe stood alone. Her brothers were here, too, but she'd requested that they leave her be. Their constant hovering was beginning to annoy her; apparently, Dr. Jameson wasn't the only one who thought she was crazy.

"Lindsay," said a voice. The girl turned to see twelve-year-old Amanda Bellamy – Jackie's sister. "Hey."

"Mands," Lindsay greeted, showing no emotion. Mands was the smaller version of Jackie – the two looked exactly alike. Same blonde hair, same greyish eyes. Lindsay had to take a deep breath, and brush a tear away from her eye. She remembered Mands and Jackie together – like twins. They were as close as twins. "How are you doing?"

Mands shrugged. She'd seen the tear that had escaped from Lindsay's eye, and she was struggling to hold it together herself. "I think I finally managed to accept that I'm now an only child," she said, trying to make it sound light. But her voice was shaky, and her accompanying smile was brief.

"I should have been with them," Lindsay whispered. The thought had been festering in her brain for the past few days, ever since the shooting, really. But it had grown and grown and grown until it took over her mind.

"Don't be silly, Lindsay," Mands told her. "Then there'd have been five deaths instead of four."

Lindsay shook her head. "No, Mands, you don't understand. I...I should have done something," she began to babble. "I should've... I should've at least died with them, Mands. I should've done something to save them -"

"Lindsay!" Mands interrupted, cutting the older girl off sharply. "There's nothing you could have done." The two girls stared at each other in silence for a moment, then Mands continued, more softly this time. "You should come to the group," she said. "It'd help. You'll see it's not your fault. You have to stop blaming yourself, Lindsay."

Lindsay swallowed, and looked away. The coffins were being brought into the cemetery, and now the crowd of mourners dressed in black was watching. The one containing the lifeless body of Kelly Thompson was lowered first, into the far-right grave. The dark wood gleamed, as if it were smug, and the metal handles showed an elegance that had been possessed by Kelly in life; she had been a dancer, and a very good one at that.

Jackie was next. Lindsay was very conscious of Mands standing next to her while the coffin disappeared into the ground. The handles were the same, yet it didn't fit. Jackie had been a tomboy, a fierce soccer player who used her muscles to win tackles. She was the sporty one. Elegance was perhaps the last thing she possessed.

Eleanor had been a dancer, too, but she wasn't half as good as Kelly. She'd done better with words; the way she could make them flow and work with each other was amazing. She'd have become a famous author one day – Lindsay was sure of it.

Sarah Gibson came next. Lindsay knew nothing about her, except from the occasional glance of her at school, and the fact that she was the waitress. Her friends were on the other side of the dark sea of people; Lindsay could see the strawberry blonde one crying.

And Lindsay was crying, too, though she wasn't sure when her tears had started. The people around her became blurred and fuzzy; the houses on the road opposite were a big, indistinct white stripe across the horizon. She wiped her eyes, but the tears didn't go away. She felt her legs wobbling, and then she felt the wet grass beneath her body. She heard unintelligible voices. Mands, maybe? Ollie and Chris?

It didn't feel like Kelly and Jackie and Eleanor and Sarah Gibson were the ones being buried today. Lindsay felt like she was sinking...sinking...sinking...she must be six feet under by now, but she kept sinking. Would she ever climb out of this hole? Or would the pain bury her alive? She didn't know.

Slowly, she began to come back to herself. She could do this, she told herself. If anyone thought she couldn't, they'd send her back to Dr. Jameson. They'd force her to have help. They'd pity her.

"Is she OK?" asked a man's voice. Lindsay looked up, and found the tears had cleared away enough for her to see who it was. The surprise must have registered on her face, because he made a small sound that could have been a chuckle. "Lindsay?"

"I'm...fine," Lindsay assured him, taking a moment to think of the right word. "I... What are you doing here?"

The man shrugged. "Sometimes I come to the victims' funerals," he told her. "I do spend a few hours with them after all...sometimes I become attached."

Lindsay knew she shouldn't be threatened. But there was something in the dull grey of Dr. Cadence's eyes that reminded her of the man she'd seen in the diner.


	5. Four: Coward

**Disclaimer from previous chapters applies. Thanks for the review from CAT217.**

**So, I've got my plot straight now. I know exactly what's happening, and I know how this is going to end. I'm not good at long stories, so it'll maybe be 10-15 chapters. Also...trying not to sound greedy here, but it'd be good if I could pull in a few more reviews?**

CHAPTER FOUR: COWARD

"Come with me," Dr. Cadence said, offering Lindsay his hand so she could get up. Swallowing hard, Lindsay took his hand and pulled herself to her feet. She knew she shouldn't be frightened. This was the man from the morgue. He was working with the good guys. He was helping her.

Yet he had the exact same eyes as the killer.

The rest of his face was different: lighter hair, a less chiselled jawline, fatter lips and thicker eyebrows. It was just the eyes. Same shape, same colour...as if he and the killer were related somehow. But even if they were, Lindsay reasoned, would Dr. Cadence even know? Had the killer confided in him?

Her gut said yes, but that, Lindsay decided, was just fear talking. So she followed the Medical Examiner out of the graveyard, leaving the dead bodies of her three friends and a waitress she'd hardly known behind. She didn't think she could stand to be there any longer, anyway.

She noticed that the sky had begun to get dark. They'd held the funeral in the evening, as the families of the other victims had wanted an entire day for a sort of memorial party. By the end of it, Lindsay had just wanted to get away from the faces – her friends' faces. She couldn't bear to see them, knowing they were dead.

Right now, though, Lindsay wasn't exactly sure where Dr. Cadence was taking her, but she followed him anyway, through the houses that looked almost fuzzy in the dark, and the dimming streets. The lights began to flicker on, one by one, lighting up the street.

Part of Lindsay was telling her something wasn't right. But, her brain argued, what exactly was wrong? What reason did she have not to trust the doctor? She knew he was harmless.

That was until, three streets away from the church, he pulled a gun on her.

"Don't scream. They won't come quick enough to save you," he growled. It didn't matter that he'd said that anyway; Lindsay had no voice to scream. She was frozen. She couldn't make herself move, not even to blink. She was a statue made of ice. Just like in the diner.

Dr. Cadence's face bore no resemblance to the man who Lindsay had met in the morgue, or seen in the graveyard. He was no longer calm, yet he wasn't angry either. More like he was...frantic, maybe? His breathing had quickened, and his mouth trembled. There was a wildness in his eyes that resembled a hungry animal – no, not hungry, Lindsay amended in her head. Closer to scared. But why would he be scared? He had the gun, and he held it steady and strong, digging into the skin of Lindsay's chest.

_Just kill her,_ a voice inside his head screamed. _For Daniel. Just pull the trigger, and it's over. Dammit, Doctor, it'll take half a second. Man up and kill the girl. _But his sweaty finger slipped on the trigger, and his hand began to tremble. The girl was terrified, he could see that. She wasn't in any state of mind to fight back.

He had time.

"Don't move," the doctor cautioned harshly. "Or I will shoot you. You hear me, Monroe?"

_Just kill her,_ the voice in his head commanded. _You're a coward, Cadence. You can't even kill a teenage girl? Not even to protect your family? Pathetic._ His hand trembled even more, and the gun jolted over the girl's skin. She didn't even seem to notice. She was staring at Cadence with an expression halfway between fear and betrayal.

Dr. Cadence had seen many a body on his slab at the morgue. He knew that, if he pulled the trigger now, this girl would end up there too. Would he perform the autopsy? Or get someone else to do it? He would say he'd left the girl a couple of streets away from the church, that he'd told her what was happening in the case even though he technically couldn't, because he knew she'd want to know...

Would he perform the autopsy?

Would there even be an autopsy? Did he even have the courage to kill this teenage girl?

_Come on, coward. It'll take half a second. For Daniel. And then it's over, and she's safe._

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

"Where'd Linds go?" asked Chris. "I thought I saw her with you."

Mands shrugged. "She went with some guy. He knew who she was, and she seemed to recognise him. Didn't seem to happy about it."

Chris and Ollie exchanged a glance. _Didn't seem to happy about it..._ Neither of them voiced their thoughts, but both were thinking the same thing. She recognised the guy...from the diner? Had she been so scared of the killer she'd followed him?

But what if it wasn't? They'd have made total fools of themselves, Chris thought...but Lindsay's safety was more important than that, wasn't it? Even if there was the slightest chance she was in danger, that the man really was the killer, especially since -

"She'll be here somewhere," Ollie said, trying to keep his voice from shaking. "She can't have gone far. Someone'll have seen her." Chris nodded, and forced the notion that the killer had her out of his mind. How would he have gotten into the funeral, anyway? Nobody was here that hadn't been at the church all day. He was sure Lindsay would've spotted him earlier, and alerted someone.

Unless she was too scared of him.

The two brothers started to ask around. Sarah's friends hadn't seen her, but Kelly's parents thought they'd spotted her with a man. They didn't come up with anything useful until they met a couple of boys in Lindsay's year at school.

Sam Bergmann had been crying. He'd liked Kelly for a long time – almost for as long as he'd known her. He'd never really gotten the chance, or the courage, to talk to her until the end of freshman year. And then, just a couple of weeks into the summer, she was dead. And she and him would never, ever be. His blonde head was digging into his dark-haired friend's shoulder, but the other boy wasn't complaining. On the contrary, he was trying to comfort his friend.

Zach Wells wasn't good at comforting, and it didn't help that he was upset himself. Unlike Sam, he'd gone to the same middle school as the girls, and he'd known them longer than Sam had. But he found it was him comforting Sam in the end. He should've known; he'd figured out how much Sam liked Kelly around Christmas, when he'd told her to have a good break from school, and then turned the colour of a tomato.

"Sam. Zach. You seen Lindsay anywhere?" Chris asked. He knew these boys; he was friends with Sam's brother. Zach hung around with Sam a lot, so Chris had gotten to know the other boy over the years.

Sam shook his head and continued crying, even though Zach's shirt was already wet through. Zach rubbed his back, feeling awkward, but he nodded to Chris. "Yeah. I saw her leaving by the back gate. She was with this guy, but I didn't get a good look at him," he told the older boy. "I guessed he might've been your dad or something."

"They left?" Ollie growled. Zach flinched a little; he'd never liked it when people got angry.

"Yeah...uh, I'm sorry, Ollie. I should've made sure I knew who he was..." Zach began to babble. "I should've made sure she was OK with him, I'm sorry. I – I – Just don't be mad, man -"

"I have every right to be mad, Zachary Wells," Ollie said angrily. Really, he wasn't angry with Zach so much as concerned about his sister, but he needed somewhere to vent his emotions. "And you _should _be sorry. You better hope she's safe." Zach flinched back, braced in case Ollie began to hit him.

"Come on, Ollie," Chris begged, tugging on his brother's shirt. "We've got to find Linds, Ollie. Come on."

Reluctantly, Ollie turned away from Zach, with a final glare, and followed Chris out of the dark trees and into the dim light of the overhead lights on the street. "Lindsay?" he called. "Linds? Where are you?"

Maybe they should've called the police, but that didn't occur to them as they patroled the streets in the evening light. They kept calling Lindsay's name, but there never was a reply. They didn't know where she'd gone, or who the man was she'd been with. Both prayed and prayed and hoped it wasn't the killer – though, with every time a call of her name was followed by silence, that thought persisted in making them more worried than either of them had ever been before.

Adam Cadence, however, had heard the calls. His gun was still pushing into Lindsay's chest, his hands were still sweating, and he was still fighting the internal battle over whether to kill her or not. _Coward,_ the voice inside his head sneered. _They'll find you soon. Just kill her and run. They'll never find out it's you..._

"Listen to me, Monroe," he muttered, harsh and fast, into the young witness' ear. She managed a small, frightened nod. "You keep your mouth shut. You hear me, Monroe? You say anything, I'll know before they come for me." He struggled for a suitable threat, and after a moment he continued. "If you speak, Monroe, I'll kill you. But not before I make you watch the deaths of those brothers of yours...Chris and Ollie, isn't it?"

He kept his gun trained on Lindsay until he reached an alley between the houses, but she didn't move. Then he turned and sped off down the alley, hoping that his threat had been enough to scare the girl off talking. He didn't want to think about what might happen if his colleagues found out he'd threatened a witness, and told her not to speak.

They might find out it was Daniel.

"Lindsay? Lindsay?"

Lindsay had been scared when she'd heard the first calls from her brothers. She'd thought Cadence would kill her right away, if he saw her brothers, and then he'd kill them too... But now it was safe. "Here!" she managed to call out, and a few seconds later, both her brothers were hugging her. She gasped for breath – they were crushing her. Seeing that she was in pain, Chris let go, and Ollie loosened his grip. He grabbed her shoulders and looked her in the eye, brown to brown.

The same eyes. They had the same eyes. She and Ollie. The killer and Cadence... Ollie was her brother. Was the killer Cadence's?

"Linds, I thought..." Ollie muttered. "Oh, Linds. We thought he had you. The killer - Mands said you seemed to recognise the man you left with...who was it? She said you didn't like that he was there -"

"The Medical Examiner," she interrupted. "He was leaving anyway. And I...I couldn't bear to be there any more. He went home." Lindsay rubbed the red patch on her chest from the gun

"What's that?" asked Chris, sharply.

"Nothing," Lindsay lied. "I tripped. Fell on a stone."

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

Lindsay's brothers took her straight to the hospital. Earlier, before the funeral, Chris had received a call from their dad. Their mom had woken up, and they were being transported back to Montana – thankfully not in an airplane. The father would be fine to go home, though he would never be able to walk again, but the mother could be up and about in as little as a week.

"Mom!" Lindsay cried as soon as they got into her hospital room. She'd felt almost like an orphan the past few days; her parents hadn't been there, and her friends were dead. It was good to have something back.

"Lindsay!" the girl's mother exclaimed in relief. "How have you been? Be honest."

Lindsay exhaled. "It's been..." she murmured, and then trailed off. Isabel Monroe raised her eyebrows, waiting for an answer.

"It's OK to talk about it, Lindsay," she told her daughter. Oliver Sr. sighed from his wheelchair on the other side of the bed. Ollie and Chris were watching Lindsay; they knew that she'd had enough breakdowns in the past few days to last a lifetime. The amount of tears she'd shed...well, they were surprised that the house hadn't flooded.

But Lindsay had become quiet again. She inhaled deeply, staring at the floor, and fiddling with her mother's bedsheets. "I don't know, Mom," she said in a barely-audible voice.

Ollie pressed his lips together. He was hurting – and hurting bad – for his sister. _I don't know_...was that something they all said? People who were struggling with something? What did it mean, anyway? _I don't know..._ Did she actually not know? Or did she mean she didn't know how to phrase it? Did she know, but not want to say?

"It's OK, petal," Isabel murmured, pulling her daughter close. For now, she was just glad that the whole family was still alive. "It'll all be OK, I promise. Someday."

But Lindsay knew that nothing, ever, could bring Kelly, Jackie and Eleanor back. Right now, they were lying beneath the earth, as the undertakers covered their coffins with dirt and left them to rot.


	6. Five: Nightmares

**Disclaimer from previous chapters applies. Again, thanks for the lone review...it's always you, isn't it, CAT217? Thanks for sticking with me.**

**I'm back at school now and working hard because I don't really want to fail my GCSEs. So from now on updates will be on Fridays or weekends, and maybe an extra one during the week if I don't have too much work to do.**

CHAPTER FIVE: NIGHTMARES

The next six weeks passed far too slowly for Lindsay's liking. All the fun things they used to do during the summer – the sleepovers, going to camp together, hanging around in Tania's Diner... All that was gone.

Lindsay didn't go to camp. She and Eleanor would've been going to the same one, and she couldn't bear going without her. Kelly would've been going to a camp, too... Lindsay remembered, right before they got onto the subject of Sam Bergmann in the diner that day, how Kelly had admitted she hadn't even packed yet. And Jackie had told her she could get Sam to help if she wanted...

Mands convinced her to try group therapy. The first time she went, she sat under the wary eyes of the people who ran the group, feeling exactly as she did in Dr. Jameson's office. The rest of the people in the group seemed indifferent to her presence, so she kept to herself. No need to have more people thinking she was crazy.

She saw Dr. Jameson again, twice, and only because her brothers forced her. At first, she decided to try and give him a chance, but she ended up getting angry again. Outside his office for the last time, Lindsay knew she wouldn't even try this time.

"Hello, Lindsay," Dr. Jameson said, as his last client – a girl in the junior year at Lindsay's school – left the office. "Come in. I hope we've got over our anger issues a bit, have we?"

He kept his eyes trained on her. She swallowed. _He's waiting for me to do something crazy, _she thought. But she didn't say anything.

Dr. Jameson raised his eyebrows. "Well, then, Lindsay. How have you been doing in the week since I last saw you?" He dipped his head, so he could look at her properly.

And she snapped. "Stop looking at me like that!" she yelled suddenly, not bothering about who could hear her, or whether Dr. Jameson would think she was more crazy now than he originally thought. "I'm not crazy, OK? I'm. Not. Crazy. I don't need to be here. If my family didn't insist, then I wouldn't be! Everyone thinks I'm crazy now. Everyone thinks I've gone mad. Do you know what that's like? So stop acting like I'm going to do something crazy at any minute. Stop expecting it. I've had enough."

With that, Lindsay stormed out of the room, and out of the building. Her father and eldest brother, who'd come with her to the appointment, followed after her hurriedly.

Lindsay never went back to that clinic – or another one, for that matter. She never went back to group therapy either, no matter how much her parents and her brothers begged her. In fact, she hardly ever left the house until school started.

School. Lindsay had been dreading it all summer. She had no idea what school would be like without Kelly, Eleanor and Jackie. The four had been friends for pretty much all of their school life, and now Lindsay had to face it alone.

She sat in class alone. In World History, she sat on their usual row of four, second from the back, alone. In French, she sat on her own as always; the others had all taken Spanish, which Lindsay had never been good at. When it came to Chemistry, she sat in her usual place. Unfortunately, Miss Quinn decided everyone needed a partner. Zach had to come sit next to Lindsay, since he was the only other one there without a partner; Sam was with a new boy called Callum.

"Hi," Zach said.

"Hey," Lindsay responded. Zach smiled at her, and then looked down at his book. _Well, at least he doesn't think I'm crazy, _Lindsay reasoned. Zach had never been her favourite person, but then she didn't know him too well.

"I – uh, you know who I am, right?" Zach muttered. "I mean, it's OK if you don't, but -"

Lindsay raised her eyebrows as she cut him off. "You're Zach." The boy's smile grew wider. She knew who he was... "We went to middle school together, remember? You sat behind me in English, eighth grade, and threw paper airplanes at me when Miss Anderson wasn't watching."

Zach laughed. "Yeah, I guess – I should've remembered that. Uh...so, um, how are you? You know...after – well it was over a month ago now, but...this is the first day of school without them, right?"

Lindsay would've laughed at the almost frightened tone of his voice, but she was instantly reminded of the thoughts she'd been avoiding all day. If she'd done..._something_ to save her friends, then she wouldn't be all alone now. She should've done something, she should've saved them... She couldn't shake the feeling that it was her fault they were dead.

Zach saw her expression. "Sorry, I didn't mean to upset you," he muttered, the words tumbling out of his mouth like a rushing river. "I'm sorry, Lindsay – I really am. I should've thought before I said that, I – uh – yeah, I should've -"

"Stop," Lindsay commanded. "It's not your fault they're dead."

Zach looked surprised. "It's not your fault either." But Lindsay had to disagree. She looked down at her Chemistry textbook as a single tear escaped her left eye. By any standards, this wasn't the first tear she'd shed, but it was the first one Zach had seen. "Lindsay, don't cry, please. I hate it when people cry...I'm no good at – well, you know, being here for people. I don't know how to do it, Lindsay. What – what do you want me to do? Do you want me to -"

A small chuckle escaped Lindsay's lips. "Calm down, Zach," she told him, quietly. "I'm not going to get mad at you."

"Phew," Zach sighed. Just then, Miss Quinn noticed them.

"Wells! Monroe!" she shouted. Lindsay noticed Zach's instinctive flinch, and guessed he didn't like it when people got angry. "Pay attention! If I catch the two of you talking again, it'll be detention!" She turned back to the board then, and continued explaining how different metals reacted with different acids. Eventually, she left them with a practical to do.

"Do you want to go first?" Lindsay offered, but Zach shook his head.

"No – uh, I don't...I've never been good at science," he explained. "I – I just don't get it. I mean...I'm not good at much, well, anything really -"

"Zach," Lindsay said, interrupting him again. She paused while she tried to find the right thing to say. "You're good at loads of things. I've seen you run. You're the fastest in the entire school, Zach. You could probably get into the Olympics someday."

Zach stared at her for a long moment. "You...you really think I could?" he questioned. His mouth twitched as if he wanted to smile, but was stopping himself.

Lindsay smiled at him. "Yeah, I think you could," she told him. And then he really smiled, a heart-stopping, genuine smile. Lindsay found herself admiring his looks; his dark hair was slightly lighter than hers, and it went perfectly with his green eyes. His face was covered in different sized freckles, which made him look younger than he was, and it went perfectly with his puppy-dog nature.

In fact, Zach was reminding Lindsay a little of Eleanor a few years ago – never sure of anything, least of all herself...but Lindsay stopped that train of thought there. Thinking about Eleanor was painful.

_But then you'll forget, _a little voice in the back of her mind whispered.

"Well...uh, thanks," Zach muttered. "Can you, um, explain what we're doing? Because Miss is coming our way and, um, we haven't done anything."

"Sure," Lindsay said, and then launched into an explanation about what they were doing, demonstrating the first reaction to Zach. Although she went too fast for him in places, he managed to work out the second one, filling in the table they had to complete with only a little help from Lindsay.

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

_The gun jabbed into her chest, cutting deep into her skin. She cried and screamed and yelled for help, but nobody came. Nobody could hear. Her screams were silent._

_Darkness was falling – so fast and so black that she couldn't even see the man's face. "Please," she begged, but he didn't hear. She knew nobody could see her now. The streetlamps provided no light to see by tonight._

"_I'm going to kill you," the man growled. "Hear me, little girl? You're going to die. I'm going to silence you, forever. You won't be able to help the police any more."_

"_Please! No!" she cried desperately. "Please don't -"_

Lindsay awoke to the sound of a gunshot. Shaking, sweating, gasping for breath, she sat up in her bed, unsure if the gunshot was part of her dream, or if it was real.

It was probably just a car backfiring, she thought, clambering out of bed. The scene outside her window was black velvet, with a few small pricks of light shining through in the night sky. Stars. But Lindsay didn't stay to ponder them. She hurried to Chris' bedroom, then Ollie's, and then her parents'. All fine. All good.

She must have dreamt that gunshot, yet she couldn't shake it from her mind. That night, so many weeks ago now, was imbedded in her memory the same as the night her friends died. Though nightmares about her friends' deaths came to her more often, the ones about the Medical Examiner were harder to shake.

Should she have done something? Should she have told someone?

The obvious answer was yes. Because there was some connection between Dr. Adam Cadence and the man who killed Lindsay's friends. And if she'd told the police, then they could find that connection, and maybe, possibly, the animal himself.

Yet Lindsay knew she would never forget any detail of the day Kelly, Eleanor and Jackie died. Dr. Cadence had warned her that if she told anyone, if she didn't keep her mouth shut, then those wouldn't be the only murders she witnessed. Her brothers would join the pile of bodies. And this time, she wouldn't live to tell the tale.

No. She couldn't say a word about Dr. Cadence. For her brothers' safety more than her own.

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

It was six weeks since the doctor's attack on Lindsay, and he'd been fearing her saying something ever since. Not for much longer, though. He'd left no trace of himself in Bozeman except a memory, and no trail to follow in case the girl did speak. He was safe.

He'd secured a job in the New Orleans Police Department under a fake name, and he'd bought a house nearby. He'd organised his new life perfectly over the past six weeks, and nobody would ever know. Now he was flying away from Montana, the only home he'd ever known...

Who knew crime could get you into such a sticky web that you had to use forgery and deception to get out of it?

Well, maybe he should have thought of that before... But what could he have done differently? Not protecting Daniel was a definite no. This was Daniel's choice, not his.

And for the first time, the Medical Examiner felt anger towards his cousin, the man who'd made him lie, and attack a teenage girl, and move away leaving no trace of himself behind...the man who'd made sure he could never return home. But then, Daniel could never return, either.

But Daniel had asked for this. Not him.

He wasn't a victim. He wouldn't call himself that, not quite. He was a man who'd been pushed into committing a crime by love for his cousin – a man who was a brother in many ways. He'd made mistakes that could get him put away for a very, very long time. He'd almost killed an innocent teenage girl – and all of a sudden, Adam Cadence wished that the girl would've spoken. Or, at least, that she would speak now, so that the truth might come out. Maybe they'd track him down, maybe they wouldn't. He'd leave it to them.

Adam Cadence knew that he was not a good man. But he resolved to change that now. He would never, ever make those mistakes again.

**I don't particularly like the ending here...but there you have it. Adam Cadence's official exit from the story.**

**That chapter was by far the hardest to write so far, and I'm not too pleased with the results. Next update might not be until next week, but I'll try and get it done this weekend if I can.**


	7. Six: Friendship

**Disclaimer from previous chapters applies, plus the lyrics used in this chapter are from Phil Collins' song In The Air Tonight and do not belong to me.**

**I got two reviews this time! Thanks, guys! I really appreciate it =)**

**I wanted to do a chapter with song lyrics sort of scattered throughout the writing. It took me a while to find the right song, but in the end, I think this one was perfect. I don't know how well it worked, and it's something I've never done before, but I was pretty pleased with it personally.**

CHAPTER SIX: FRIENDSHIP

Isolated. Alone. Disconnected from the world. That's how Lindsay felt. Almost as if she were in quarantine with some deadly disease. People would avoid her eyes in the hallways, and whisper to their friends when she came past. Sometimes, they'd say a word or two to her.

"I'm sorry about what happened, Lindsay," one girl would say.

"I'm here for you if you need someone to talk to," said the next.

"Listen, Lindsay," another would tell her. "I understand what you're going through. My uncle died of cancer – I know what it's like to lose people. But you can come hang out with me and my friends if you want to, OK?"

It wasn't the fact that she knew the names of none of these girls that bothered Lindsay the most. They were just trying to be nice. They were trying to help, she knew that. It was that third girl who bothered her..._I understand what you're going through._

No. She didn't. Her uncle died? She didn't witness his murder. He died slowly; she had time to say goodbye. Maybe, yes, she lost him, but there was no way she could understand what Lindsay was going through. She hadn't been through what Lindsay'd been through.

Nobody would understand.

So Lindsay began to hide in the toilets at breaktimes and lunchtimes, only emerging to go to lessons. It was the only way she could be sure that no interfering freshmen were going to come and pity her, or that Sarah's junior-year friends weren't going to whisper if she passed them in the hallway. At home, her brothers watched over her every move, so much that she could hardly be herself for fear of them worrying.

In fact, the only time she felt vaguely human was in Chemistry lessons. Zach sat next to her, chatted to her. He made her laugh, smile, and temporarily forget about how much of a nightmare her life had become since that day in the diner. In less than a week, she felt closer to Zach than she'd ever been to anyone except her dead friends and her closest family.

He was her walking stick. He helped her stand, helped her hobble along the twisting, turning road of life.

Yet outside of Chemistry, Zach had other friends, and Lindsay had nobody. So she was confined to a 36" by 60" toilet stall in break and lunchtimes. She didn't dare go to the cafeteria and get food, lest she run into some sympathetic students there, so she no longer ate during school hours.

Each time she locked the door of her stall – the farthest from the entrance of the girls' toilets – and leant against the wall, her mind wandered back to why she was in there in the first place, and the man who'd made her life a misery.

Covered in blood from head to toe, with stony grey-blue eyes and brown hair, the face glared at Lindsay out of her memory. How much would she give to have her revenge on this man? To meet him again, and have the power to harm him somehow, cripple him for life or kill him...

The lyrics to a song – one of Kelly's favourites, one that seemed to be playing every time Lindsay was at her house – shifted to the forefront of the girl's brain.

_I can feel it coming in the air tonight, oh Lord  
And I've been waiting for this moment for all my life, oh Lord  
Can you feel it coming in the air tonight, oh Lord, oh Lord_

She would wait for all her life for that moment, for that revenge. She didn't have to think about it at all. She would kill that man without a second thought, whether she was locked in jail for life, or if it were the last thing she did on this earth. He deserved it.

_Well if you told me you were drowning, I would not lend a hand_

And she wouldn't ever forgive anyone who did.

_I've seen your face before my friend, but I don't know if you know who I am_

Lindsay froze. She hadn't been moving much anyway; she never did whilst she was in the toilet stall. But her breathing stopped, and her lungs turned to ice.

Did he know she'd seen him?

He must do. Otherwise he wouldn't have set Dr. Cadence on her...Lindsay wondered what kind of threats the killer had given the Medical Examiner. Had he taken his family? Threatened to kill the man? Had he given Cadence the exact same threat that the latter had given Lindsay?

Had Cadence spared Lindsay's life even though he'd been instructed to kill her? To Lindsay, it felt that way. The killer was not a man of mercy. He wouldn't let her live.

Lindsay was sure that Dr. Cadence had not been acting of his own accord. He was with the good guys. The police. He'd been trying to help...

She wondered if she should tell someone what Dr. Cadence had done. But who was there to tell? Her brothers would fuss over her, her dad would ask why she hadn't said something earlier, and her mother would worry.

Zach? But, if she was honest, she didn't really know him that well.

_Well I was there and I saw what you did, I saw it with my own two eyes  
So you can wipe off that grin, I know where you've been  
It's all been a pack of lies_

Those lines conjured up the killer's face in Lindsay's mind again, but this time, he wasn't expressionless. He was grinning. An evil, triumphant smile. He was almost celebrating...

The toilet stall began to spin, faster and faster. Lindsay nearly fell over as she unlocked the door. She wasn't sure why, but she needed to get out.

The sound of a faucet running penetrated her mind. Someone was washing their hands.

And, as she had been so many times in her nightmares, Lindsay was transported back to that fateful day in the diner. The water splashing in the sink next to her. The face of the killer, a triumphant smile now spread across his face.

"Lindsay? Lindsay!" a voice cried, but Lindsay wasn't sure where it was coming from. The screams, she thought. They were screaming...

"Is she OK?" another voice asked.

"I don't know," the first girl replied, as the song continued playing in Lindsay's head. "She looks dazed..."

_And I can feel it coming in the air tonight, oh Lord  
Well I've been waiting for this moment for all my life, oh Lord  
I can feel it coming in the air tonight, oh Lord  
Well I've been waiting for this moment for all my life, oh Lord, oh Lord_

_Well I remember, I remember, don't worry, how could I ever forget  
It's the first time, the last time we ever met_

Lindsay knew she would never forget. Every single detail of that day was burned into her mind. A man she'd never seen before, a man she'd probably never see again...because, despite Officer Lee's promise, the case had never been solved. And now, it probably never would be.

"_We will, Lindsay," the officer said. "We will find him. I promise." _Empty words. Lies. A broken promise.

"Get the nurse." It was the second voice that jolted Lindsay from her memories. "I don't know what's wrong with her, Rubes."

"I'm fine," Lindsay managed to mumble.

_But I know the reason why you keep your silence up, oh no you don't fool me  
Well the hurt doesn't show, but the pain still grows  
It's no stranger to you and me_

But he wasn't in pain. It was she who'd lost almost everything that day.

"Are you sure, Lindsay?" the strawberry blonde girl asked. Lindsay was aware enough of her surroundings now to recognise her. Ruby Emerson, a girl in her English class. The other girl was blonde, and Lindsay didn't know her name though she'd seen her with Ruby many times before.

"Yeah. I'm OK," Lindsay managed to get out. In all the weeks since her friends' deaths, she hadn't had flashbacks as strong as that. Nightmares, sure. But not when she was awake.

The song lyrics bounced around her skull, painfully repetetive now, as Ruby and her blonde-haired friend helped Lindsay to her feet. Staggering a little, Lindsay managed to take a few steps forwards.

_I can feel it coming in the air tonight, oh Lord  
Well been waiting for this moment for all my life, oh Lord  
I can feel it in the air tonight, oh Lord, oh Lord_

"I think you should probably go home, Lindsay," Ruby said, but Lindsay shook her head.

_Well I've been waiting for this moment for all my life, oh Lord  
I can feel it coming in the air tonight, oh Lord_

"I'm fine, Ruby, really," she muttered.

_And I've been waiting for this moment for all my life, oh Lord  
I can feel it in the air tonight, oh Lord, oh Lord, oh Lord  
Well I've been waiting for this moment for all my life, oh Lord, oh Lord_

"Hmm..." It was obvious that Ruby didn't really like this idea. "Well...what do you think, Janet?"

The blonde girl, Janet, shrugged. "We only have one lesson after lunch. I'm sure she could survive that." She smiled warily at Lindsay.

Great, thought the darker-haired girl. Someone else who thought she was crazy.

Lindsay turned to leave, but Ruby stopped her. "Hey, um, Lindsay? Do you, well, have anyone to spend lunch with and stuff?" Lindsay shook her head, and Ruby continued. "You could always hang with me and Janet. We don't mind."

_I can feel it in the air tonight, oh Lord, oh Lord, oh Lord, oh Lord  
Well I've been waiting for this moment for all my life, oh Lord, oh Lord, oh Lord _

It took a while for Lindsay to process this. "Like...friends?" she asked. After what happened in the diner, she wasn't sure if she'd ever set herself up to fall so big again. Even if it meant getting close to people.

Ruby read her expression perfectly. "Friendly acquaintances," she ruled. Lindsay nodded.

"OK. Fine," Lindsay responded. A slight smile crossed Ruby's features, and Lindsay's mouth twitched a bit. No more hiding in the toilets for her...

Just then, the bell rang, and the three girls headed off to their lessons. Ruby and Janet both had Biology, but Lindsay had Chemistry. The weight on her shoulders seemed to lighten as she headed towards the classroom.

"Lindsay," Zach greeted her as she sat down. "You, uh, you kind of look like hell...no offence or anything."

Lindsay managed a small chuckle. Zach seemed so unsure of everything he said, it was almost funny – except, of course, for the fact that Lindsay wasn't blind to the self-doubt that always seemed to consume Zach's mind.

"So, um, how was your day?" he asked. And, for some reason, Lindsay launched into the entire tale of her past few weeks. Hiding in the toilets wasn't something that had come up in casual conversation with Zach, but in the end, it wasn't something she was trying to hide. She trusted Zach.

"I – I just don't know what's going on any more," she said to conclude her tale. And then, without warning, Zach wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into a tight, warm hug.

**OK, I admit, not the best I've written. But there are a few good twists to come...if I do say so myself.**


	8. Seven: First Date

**Disclaimer from previous chapters applies. Again, thanks to CAT217 for the review.**

**So I thought I'd send Lindsay on a date... Personally, I've never been out with anyone, so I've no idea exactly what it's like. But hey. I'm sure it's different for everyone anyway, especially for Lindsay and... Actually, I'm not going to tell you who it is just yet. Read on.**

CHAPTER SEVEN: FIRST DATE

Janet didn't seem to like Lindsay so much. It was explainable, really; Janet and Ruby had been best friends since elementary school, and now here was Lindsay. Barging in on their friendship.

To be fair, Janet was trying to hide her feelings. She knew Lindsay didn't have anyone else any more, and that Ruby was just trying to be nice. But, as another week slipped by and they entered the third week of the semester, Janet found herself being pushed more and more to the side.

It was Lindsay that Ruby told her dreams and deepest secrets to now. It was Lindsay that she laughed with over the jokes that Janet had become the butt of. It was Lindsay who seemed to have taken Janet's place at Ruby's side.

Friendly acquaintances what what Ruby had promised, but that had soon been forgotten.

Little did Janet know, Lindsay didn't like it, either. Ruby was just trying to include her, but it made her feel guilty. Like she was forgetting her real friends. Kelly. Eleanor. Jackie. What would they think of her if they knew she'd forgotten their friendship? If they saw that she'd found new friends? They would feel betrayed.

And here she was, betraying them.

It was much simpler with Zach. Her friendship with Zach had never ventured away from that desk in the Chemistry lab. She'd had friendships like that before – for one hour a day, just for classes where Eleanor, Jackie and Kelly were in a different lesson. French. She'd had Lily in French, before the girl had started looking at her with expressions of pity and sympathy.

But she couldn't justify her friendship with Ruby and Janet.

She pondered this at lunchtime one day. She and Ruby were doing English homework in the library. Janet had squashed herself between the two, and it seemed to Lindsay that she was trying to block the girl off. She was helping Ruby, and not paying any attention to Lindsay at all.

"Don't be so rude, Jan," Lindsay heard Ruby mutter to Janet. "Stop ignoring Lindsay, OK?"

Janet just rolled her eyes. Lindsay sighed. She hadn't noticed before now, but looking back on the past week...she wasn't surprised Janet didn't like her. All those breaktimes and lunchtimes she'd spent with them, Janet always seemed to be in the background. Ruby'd been concentrating on Lindsay, and she'd forgotten the girl who was her best friend.

Or, to look at it another way, Lindsay had stolen Ruby.

"Um, Lindsay?" a voice asked. All three girls looked up to see a boy standing there, holding a book. He took a deep breath, nervously. "I was, uh, wondering if you wanted to, erm, go out with me?"

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

Lindsay wasn't sure why she'd agreed. She'd never been out with a boy before now, and this boy certainly wouldn't have been her first choice if he hadn't asked.

_You guys are way too picky._

That sentence floated through her mind again. The last thing she'd ever said to her friends, the last sentence they'd heard from her before that man walked in and -

And killed them. Lindsay cursed internally at her automatic cutting-off of that train of thought. It should be OK to say the words, think about them. He killed them.

Maybe that one sentence was why she was here. That and the words Jackie had said right before: _Nobody would want to go out with Sam Bergmann. Except Linds, of course. Most other people have some kind of taste in guys._

That was last thing she'd ever hear from Jackie – that she didn't have any taste in guys. So now she was in the woods with the picnic she and Sam had packed earlier that day. They'd spread the tartan blanket out, and they sat opposite each other.

"So," Sam said eventually, digging into a ham sandwich. "You were friends with Kelly, weren't you? Before...y'know."

_Sam's not a jerk like most other guys... _It was Lindsay who'd said that in the diner. Not a jerk? He'd just brought up the one thing that he must've known Lindsay didn't want to talk about. If that wasn't jerk behaviour, then what was?

Sam read her expression. "Sorry, Lindsay," he apologised. "I...I should've known not to say that. I'm sorry."

Lindsay nodded. Of course, she shouldn't have been so quick to judge. It was a simple mistake...yet it was something he couldn't take back now. He'd said the words. Maybe she was right to judge quickly.

"How's the chess going?" Lindsay asked, picking up a home-made sausage roll. Sam's brother, Kyle, had made them; Kyle prided himself on his cooking the same way Sam prided himself on chess.

Sam smiled. "You pay attention to me?" He grabbed one of his brother's sausage rolls as well.

"Eleanor, actually," Lindsay replied. _You just don't like him because he's the only one who can beat you at chess, Els. _"She plays chess, too. She saw you playing the difficult setting on the library computers once, and she was pretty scared of your skills."

Sam's smile grew wider. "Really?"

Nodding, Lindsay grabbed another of the sausage rolls. _I've never even played him... _"That's why she never played you."

"Oh," Sam said, simply. He grabbed some of the cheesy crisps. "OK."

Lindsay looked down at the blanket they were sitting on. It was mostly dark red, but there were yellows and greens and blues striped across the fabric both horizontally and vertically. True Scottish style.

She should've known that talking about her friends would make it awkward. But then, it wasn't she who'd brought the subject up in the first place. And maybe it would've been awkward anyway; after all, Sam Bergmann was the focus of the very last conversation she'd had with her friends. And here she was, eight weeks later, on a date with him.

"You were the last thing," Lindsay admitted quietly. She might as well put it out there. Sam looked up.

"What?"

"You were the last thing we talked about. In the diner. That's why I remember so much about you," Lindsay explained. "How I remembered that you never played Eleanor at chess. I wouldn't have remembered...if nothing had happened."

Sam stared at the girl for a long time. Suddenly, neither of them were hungry any more, but neither voiced this. A whole minute ticked by in silence. A bird chirped and landed in a tree nearby. Another minute. The wind whistled through the trees, rustling the leaves and making a sort of natural music. Yet another minute.

"Did she say anything about me?" Sam questioned eventually. "Kelly. Did she say anything?"

_I said he could beat Els at chess. I didn't say I wanted to go out with him!_

Lindsay dodged the question. Something was nagging at her, but she wasn't sure what. "We all did."

Sam swallowed. "What did she say?"

Their eyes met, brown to blue, and suddenly Lindsay was angry. "What is it with Kelly? Why do you keep talking about her? This was supposed to be you and me, Sam! Not Kelly, not the others – though I have noticed you haven't mentioned either Eleanor or Jackie's names. But this isn't about them. They're gone, and they're not coming back. OK?"

_Seriously, Linds, give Kelly a break. Just because Sam Bergmann asked her out and she turned him down -_

And then Lindsay understood.

"You liked her, didn't you?" she whispered.

"What? Are you finished being mad at me?"

Lindsay swallowed. Sam was grieving too, she reminded herself – much more than she'd thought he was, as well. That's why they were here in the first place. He'd wanted to know if Kelly had talked about him, even noticed him. That's why he'd brought up her name straight away. Because he wanted to know.

It must have been eating at him.

"I'm sorry, Sam," Lindsay muttered. "This wasn't about me and you, was it? It was about Kelly."

Sam looked at her for a long moment before he nodded. Then his eyes shifted away, darting around to different places in the nearby trees, until they landed on the blanket.

"It was about her for me, too," Lindsay continued, slightly louder now. "Her and the others. All three of them. Because...we were talking about you. That's the only reason I came."

A long moment passed, and then, by some sort of unspoken agreement, the two teenagers started packing up the food into the picnic basket they'd brought from Sam's house. Then they folded up the blanket, and started to make their way back.

Lindsay pondered over what she'd achieved by coming out in the woods today. Nothing, really. Between them, they'd managed to make today and any future interactions awkward, and that was it.

Until, of course, she saw the river.

It was the same one, she was sure of it. The river out of the documentary she'd watched the day after her friends died. She'd almost forgotten about that, and how interesting it'd been to her. Crime scene science. Finding the killer.

Of course, back then, she'd still believed they'd find her friends' killer.

"Wait," she called to Sam. How could she not have noticed this on the way up? Had they come a different route? Or was she just really unobservant?

Slowly, she made her way down to the river's edge. It was definitely the same river; the body had knocked a small portion off the bank near a tree, like a landslide. Lindsay bent down and touched the mud where he'd lain.

Her mind took her back to another crime scene: the diner. Seeing her friends lying there, remembering the man lying here. Finding the man's killer, not finding her friends' murderer... Hearing the shots when her friends died. Not knowing which order they died in, but knowing they died together. This man, who died alone...

Lindsay swallowed. Emotion had overtaken her body, and she was on her knees. The tears poured out, silently, and she brushed them away. Somewhere behind her, Sam didn't notice.

In the end, she managed to get to her feet and stumble back to Sam.

"You were crying?" he asked. "Lindsay, I'm so sorry, I should've known not to talk about that -"

"Not about that," Lindsay managed to choke out, and she turned and headed back toward Bozeman. Sam followed close behind, and neither of them said another word.

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

Chemistry. Always after lunch. Always at the end of the day. Not that Lindsay was complaining. The days would drag by even slower without it.

Well, without Zach.

She'd spent the day avoiding Ruby's interrogative questions about her date with Sam, trying to avoid Janet's deathly stare, and, in the end, escaping to the library to get away from their heated argument. Which was, of course, about her.

By the time Chemistry came along, she was ready to go home and lie in bed and sleep until Christmas. Zach began babbling on about something, but Lindsay really wasn't in the mood to listen. She'd had enough of people today, and that included Zach.

"Um, er, Lindsay?" he asked, as he finally figured out the answer to the third question; Lindsay had already finished the sheet. "Are you – well, are you OK?"

Lindsay nodded abstractly.

"Um, so, er, how did your weekend go?" he asked. "I mean, it's totally understandable if it was really bad, I just...well, I want you to talk, really. So, er.."

"My weekend was fine," Lindsay interrupted in a cold voice.

Zach flinched. "OK," he said, the two letters tumbling out of his mouth in a high-pitched squeak. He turned back to his work.

Lindsay glanced at him. _He's supposed to be your friend, _she reminded herself. "Sam and I went on a date," she told him. "On Saturday. We went to the woods. Had a picnic."

She wasn't entirely sure what kind of noise came out of Zach's throat.

**Haha. Bet you were all expecting Lindsay's date to be Zach, weren't you? Wrong. But what do you make of his reaction right at the end there?**

**And it's really weird writing about eating sausage rolls when you're a vegetarian. I never knew that before.**


	9. Eight: House Call

**Disclaimer from previous chapters applies. Thanks to Georgia for the review =)**

**My teachers have bombarded me with homework. If I don't update for a few weeks at any point, it's not that I've stopped posting or anything. It's purely because I've got homework overload. **

**Lindsay's parents are in this one. I should use them more, but they don't have much of a role in this story. Oh well.**

_**R.I.P. to all the people who died in 9/11. I might be a British citizen, and not an American one, but that doesn't stop it being a horrible tragedy.**_

CHAPTER EIGHT: HOUSE CALL

_Should've told someone. Should've told someone. Should've told someone. _The three words had bombed the inside of Lindsay's brain like a warzone. _Should've told someone. Should've told someone. Should've told someone._ Again and again, the words hit her brain like a hammer. _Could've caught him by now. My fault. My fault they haven't._

"Lindsay?" Ruby asked, a look of concern spreading across her face. Janet almost scowled, but kept her face even. After all, she'd just had a good, long conversation with Ruby, with no Lindsay to interfere.

Lindsay poked at her cold pasta. "Yeah?" It was barely a question.

"Are you OK?" Ruby questioned. After a long pause, Lindsay shook her head.

Now that Zach didn't seem to want to talk to her any more – mainly because Lindsay hadn't even tried to explain about Sam – things had taken a turn for the worse. Lindsay didn't have anyone to keep her going. And her mind kept skipping back to Dr. Adam Cadence.

_Should've told someone. _But in reality, Lindsay didn't want to get the man into trouble. She didn't want to think that anyone would help such a heartless, cold blooded killer unless they were made to, so she believed that the Medical Examiner had been forced into his actions.

She tried to forget about the eyes.

"I...uh..." Lindsay murmured. Ruby glanced at Janet before turning back to Lindsay.

"Linds? Just tell us what's wrong, OK? We won't judge you," the strawberry blonde girl promised. Janet looked down at the table. She knew that she almost certainly would judge Lindsay, whatever she said.

"I – after the funeral," Lindsay began, and then took a deep breath. "He told me to go with him. So I did." The words were coming out like water over the Niagara Falls now. "Then he got a gun out. Told me that if I said anything, he'd -" Abruptly, Lindsay stopped. She stared out of the window, trying to hold back the tears.

Ruby wrapped her arm around the crying girl. "Shh, Lindsay. It's OK. The police can make sure he won't go through with his threat -"

"Don't tell them."

"Lindsay, we have to -" Ruby began, but Lindsay cut her off again.

"No. Don't."

"OK," Ruby said. Despite this, Lindsay was still worried that they'd go to the police. Dr. Cadence was one of them. He'd know before they could put out a protection detail or probably even react. "Do you know who it was?"

Lindsay looked over at Ruby before answering. "The Medical Examiner."

CSI:NY CSI:NY CSI:NY

_Knock knock._

The Monroe household was watching TV when the knock on the door came. Chris went to get it.

"Police!" he called through, and, a second later, Officer Jason Lee followed Chris into the living room. Officer Lee had been on the scene after Lindsay's friends were murdered, and she hadn't seen him since. Just seeing his face reminded her of that day.

And also, it reminded her that Ruby had told her she wouldn't go to the police.

"Lindsay," Officer Lee said, taking the seat beside the teenage girl when Chris offered. "I had two very interesting young ladies come to see me once school was over today. Ruby Emerson and Janet Richter. I believe you know them?"

Lindsay nodded, her jaw tightening. So Ruby _had _gone to the police. Chances were, Dr. Cadence knew already...

But Officer Lee had gotten here first. Maybe Ruby'd made sure they wouldn't tell Dr. Cadence? Lindsay should've thought of requesting that he not know...

"Why didn't you tell us what happened after the funeral earlier?" the officer asked. Lindsay swallowed, and looked at the carpet, refusing to speak, so Officer Lee continued. "Miss Emerson told me that he threatened you. Is that right?"

Lindsay managed a small nod before Ollie spoke up. "Wait. What are you talking about? What happened, Linds?"

Officer Lee told Lindsay's family what he knew. "Lindsay went with Dr. Cadence, the old ME, after the funeral. Apparently, he had a gun, which he turned on Lindsay. He told her to keep quiet, and he threatened her with something. I don't know what."

"He said he'd make me watch Ollie and Chris die and then kill me," Lindsay whispered.

"Lindsay -" Oliver Sr. said from his wheelchair, but Chris cut him off.

"What?!" he cried. He pulled Lindsay into a hug. "You know the police could have protected us," he muttered into his sister's ear. Lindsay nodded.

Officer Lee waited until the two had disentangled themselves before continuing. "Lindsay, I know this is hard, but we have a few questions for you," he told her. "Did Dr. Cadence make any references to the man who killed your friends?"

Slowly, Lindsay shook her head. If he had made any mention of the killer, she'd missed it. "But they had the same eyes," she said, regretting it as soon as she said it. She could be getting a good man into trouble here.

Officer Lee frowned, and then reached into his bag. "I brought pictures of a few potential suspects, just in case. Do you recognise either of these men?" He passed two pictures to Lindsay, but she didn't take them. Instead, she looked away, out of the window.

"I don't want to see his face."

Officer Lee sighed. "Just a quick glance, Lindsay. That's all you need to do. And then say yes, or no."

Reluctantly, Lindsay turned back to the officer. She took the pictures, but didn't look at them. She couldn't do it. She didn't want to see his face again, and she knew he was most likely one of the men in the pictures.

"Just a quick glance," the officer repeated. Lindsay looked down – and her eyes landed on the pictures.

They were remarkably similar, almost twins. Different ages, though, and slightly different faces. The one on the left looked more like the ME, but the other one...

Lindsay shook her head.

"Are you sure?" Officer Lee asked, but Lindsay was staring out of the window again, and he was talking to the back of her head.

"Who were they?" Isabel Monroe questioned from her armchair. She'd come out of the hospital around a week after the funeral, and she'd made a full recovery since.

"Dr. Cadence's brothers," the officer explained. "Lindsay, I'm going to have to ask you to make a proper statement. If you could come into the station tomorrow -"

"Aren't you going to question Dr. Cadence?" Ollie Jr. asked.

Officer Lee shook his head. "We would if we could," he assured the eldest Monroe child, "but we have no idea where he is. He's been in Missing Persons for nearly two weeks now. From what we know, I'd assume he's an accomplice of some kind. Killers rarely pick people they're related to if they're going to force someone to do something, unless it's out of extreme hatred, and I'd assume, because of the eyes, that they are related."

Lindsay turned back to stare at him. Most likely, then, Dr. Cadence had been acting of his own accord...

"But then why is he in Missing Persons? Don't you think the killer might have...disposed of him?" Oliver Sr. questioned.

"Personally?" Officer Lee clarified. "No. I think he fled."

...if she'd said something earlier, they could've questioned him. Found the killer, no doubt. It'd been her, after all, keeping the information from them. It was her fault they hadn't found him yet.

Her fault. Everything was always her fault. Nobody else seemed to acknowledge it, though – but how they must hate her, in their minds. Kelly's and Eleanor's and Jackie's families; after all, she hadn't done anything to save them, had she? In many ways, she was just as much at fault as the killer. As for her own family...she'd kept information from the police. Vital information, at that. How could they want her now? Love her? Think of her as anything more than a waste of time and energy? And Zach -

Zach wasn't talking to her much anyway. It wasn't like she'd done much wrong there, anyway. He'd just decided that his emotions were far more important than their friendship. Than Lindsay's emotions.

Lindsay was so lost in her thoughts that she didn't even notice when Officer Lee left. Ollie was watching her carefully, analysing her closed-off expression, her empty stare. Eventually, he spoke.

"Lindsay, you know it's not your fault."

His sister didn't appear to hear him at all. She just carried on staring into nothing.

"Lindsay," Oliver Sr. called his daughter's name. Her head snapped up, and her eyes travelled to her father's face. Blank. Empty. "Listen to your brother."

The girl looked down. She'd heard what Ollie'd said, of course, but she'd chosen not to react. He'd been wrong, anyway. It was her fault. How could he not see that?

Oliver Sr. watched his daughter carefully. It pained him to see her this way, especially as he couldn't hug her or pull her close as he used to be able to before the plane crash. In some ways, he couldn't be a father to his children in the way he'd been their father before.

His wife watched both of them. The wheelchair had been hard on her husband's life, and she knew he hated it, especially in moments like this. Ordinarily, he would have walked over and wrapped his arms around his daughter. But now he couldn't do that.

Isabel and her daughter used to be close. When Lindsay was smaller, she would hardly let her mother out of her sight. As soon as she became a teenager, of course, those days were over. Of course, they still loved each other, and Lindsay'd never been the stereotypical stroppy, selfish teenager type. She'd just been interested in other things. Like boys, and spending time with her friends.

Now, of course, Isabel yearned for the old days, when she and Lindsay had been almost inseparable. But she knew that she had to let go, ease her daughter into the world...and now she felt like trapping Lindsay back under that protective watch, so that nothing like that would ever happen again. The sensible part of her knew that that wasn't what Lindsay needed.

"Linds?" Ollie's voice cut through the silence again. "Stop blaming yourself. It wasn't your fault. You didn't do anything wrong. You were scared, Linds. Nobody blames you for not saying anything."

But that was a lie, thought Lindsay, because she blamed herself. And she was sure, underneath the lies, that they blamed her too. The killer could've been caught by now.

**Short chapter, bad ending etc. etc. etc. I'm sorry, OK?**


End file.
